Can America Adapt to a Changing World?

For over sixty years Americans have taken their pre-eminence in the world for granted. That status may now be palpably coming to an end as more and more of the world follows the American path to material bounty, social egalitarianism and liberal democracy. How will the United States react to this? Will it embrace the growing ranks of its peers, or will it attempt to stifle or build walls against the transformation it did so much to create?

In a brilliant new work, Indian-born American commentator Fareed Zakaria explores these questions. His new book, The Post-American World is excerpted in the current issue of Newsweek.

He illustrates:

Look around. The world's tallest building is in Taipei, and will soon be in Dubai. It largest publicly traded company is in Beijing. Its biggest refinery is being constructed in India. Its largest passenger airplane is built in Europe. The largest investment fund on the planet is in Abu Dhabi; the biggest movie industry is Bollywood (India), not Hollywood. The largest Ferris wheel is in Singapore. The largest casino is in Macao, which overtook Las Vegas in gambling last year. The Mall of America in Minnesota once boasted that it was the largest shopping mall in the world. Today it wouldn't make the top ten. In the most recent rankings, only two of the world's ten richest people are American...consider that only ten years ago, the United States would have serenely topped almost every one of these categories.

These factoids reflect a seismic shift in power and attitudes...But while we argue over why they hate us, "they" have moved on, and are now far more interested in other, more dynamic parts of the globe. The world has shifted from anti-Americanism to post-Americanism.

Think of the world 100 years ago, when Britannia ruled the waves and the sun never set on the British Empire. No financial or international action of importance was taken without turning an ear to what London might think. Today Britain is a prosperous country, but no one who isn't dealing directly with them much cares what they think. That is seemingly where the world is heading today with respect to the United States. The change appears incremental taken year by year but is breathtakingly rapid in historical terms. Zakaria maintains that this is happening not so much because the U.S. is in decline as that the rest of the world is taking off.

How much? Well, consider this fact. In 2006 and 2007, 124 countries grew their economies at over 4 percent a year. That includes more than 30 countries in Africa. Over the last two decades, lands outside the industrialized West have been growing at rates that were once unthinkable...Antoine van Agtmael, the fund manager who coined the term "emerging markets," has identified the 25 companies most likely to be the world's next great multinationals. His list includes four companies each from Brazil, Mexico, South Korea, and Taiwan; three from India, two from China, and one each from Argentina, Chile, Malaysia, and South Africa. This is something much broader than the much-ballyhooed rise of China. It is the rise of the rest--the rest of the world.

Why is this happening? Zakaria observes,

This is one of the most thrilling times in history. Billions of people are escaping from abject poverty. The world will be enriched and ennobled as they become consumers, producers,
inventors, thinkers, dreamers, and doers. This is all happening because of American ideas and actions. For 60 years, the United States has pushed countries to open their markets, free up their politics, and embrace trade and technology...Yet just as they are beginning to do so, we have become suspicious of trade, openness, immigration, and investment because now it's not Americans going abroad but foreigners coming to America. Just as the world is opening up, we are closing down.

Generations from now, when historians write about these times, they might note that by the turn of the 21st century, the United States had succeeded in its great, historical mission--globalizing the world. We don't want them to write that along the way, we forgot to globalize ourselves.